05/13/2026
This is an issue near and dear to our hearts here at CFS. There is a huge difference between Best Before and Expiry dates on food that is often misunderstood.
Best before’ date labels behind $12B in waste as food bank demand spikes
By Prisha Dev Global News
Posted May 13, 2026 12:32 pm
4 min read
As food banks across Canada continue to face record demand, billions of dollars worth of perfectly edible food is being thrown away over confusion tied to “best before” labels, a new report says.
The report from Toronto-based food rescue organization Second Harvest found that nearly 23 per cent of avoidable food waste in Canada, worth over $12 billion, can be linked to outdated practices around date coding.
“We are way behind on food waste strategy…. People are throwing away perfectly good food because they believe food is unsafe after a certain day,” said Lori Nikkel, CEO of Second Harvest.
The organization says much of the confusion stems from consumers misunderstanding the difference between “best before” dates and actual expiration dates.
This confusion amounts to an estimated 1.6 million metric tonnes of avoidable food waste.
Under current federal regulations, prepackaged foods with a shelf life of 90 days or less are required to carry a “best before” date under rules set by Health Canada and enforced by the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA).
Products with longer shelf lives are not required to carry those labels, though many manufacturers still voluntarily include them.
“There are only five [types of food] that expire in Canada,” Nikkel said. Those include infant formula, meal replacements, protein bars and two prescription-only foods.
Second Harvest says many Canadians incorrectly interpret “best before” labels as indicators of food safety, rather than food quality.
“People just do not know that a ‘best before’ date is based on the peak freshness of whatever that product is,” Nikkel said.
According to Health Canada, a “best before” date refers to when a product may begin to lose freshness, taste or nutritional value, while an expiry date indicates when certain foods should no longer be consumed for safety reasons.
The report found that Canada is falling behind several peer countries that have already modernized date-labelling systems as part of broader food waste reduction strategies.
California, for example, has standardized “best if used by” and “use by” labels and banned the use of “expires on” labels starting in July 2026.
Other countries, like Australia, the United Kingdom, Japan and South Korea, are also distinguishing between labels tied to food safety and those tied to food quality.
Nikkel added that the lack of stronger food waste policies is especially concerning at a time when food banks across the country are seeing unprecedented demand.
Neil Hetherington, CEO of Toronto’s largest food bank, the Daily Bread Food Bank, shared a similar sentiment, saying that Canada’s food waste problem has become increasingly difficult to ignore.
“Canada is the single greatest waster of food in the world,” he said. “We have great safety records as well, but you’ve got to balance those two.”
Global News reached out to the CFIA for a response regarding potential changes to date-labelling practices but did not hear back in time for publishing.
